Bria LaVorgna

Let’s get this out of the way early: No, I am not a traditional video game reviewer. Yes, it’s obviously harder for me to be completely unbiased about a game that I consulted on for years as a member of the Dragon Age Community Council. However, BioWare has never put any obligations on me nor even made any requests to say anything positive about the game that I don’t believe. Everything I have ever said and will ever say about Dragon Age: The Veilguard is my honest opinion and has been said because I wish to say it.

So. How about we put the big thing up front: Did I love it? Yes. Is it perfect? No, but what game is?

Dragon Age: The Veilguard opens how many Dragon Age fans might expect: hunting the Dread Wolf. Varric and his team (including your player character, Rook) have finally caught up with Solas as he’s attempting to perform a ritual to bring down the Veil. It all goes terribly wrong and instead, two of the elven gods are released from their prison and suddenly, Rook has a much bigger enemy (literally) and a far worse problem on their hands along with an unexpected, trickster ally. To handle this? We’re gonna need a bigger team. Time to assemble the Veilguard.

The Veilguard is one hell of a ride and an emotional and fun one at that. I spent 79 hours playing in a far shorter timeframe than I would usually put that many hours into a game so some of this is, quite frankly, colored by exhaustion. It’s a surprisingly expansive game that takes you across Northern Thedas and shows Dragon Age fans places we’ve only ever seen in comics and the animated show and through the word pictures painted by characters. While obviously heavily tied to the Trespasser DLC events, the game is welcoming to new players and steeped with lore without being bogged down by it. (More on that later.) If I had to pick a way to describe the game, I’d say it’s the child of Dragon Age 2 and Mass Effect 2 with Dragon Age: Inquisition as the cool auntie who was around a lot. It’s an emotional ride from start to finish and made me cry at least thrice while still finding moments of joy and levity to balance out the emotional weight of consequences and regret while never detracting from them. There is so much heart in this story and it’s all the stronger for it.

From a pacing perspective, the game is mostly well done. Act 1 is a logical, deliberate march to the big battle set piece that you’ll see coming from a mile away. Act 2 is perhaps… less clear with multiple points that will likely have players asking themselves, “Is this the end of Act 2?” (The answer is no, it’s not. You’ll know when Act 3 starts.) The majority of the game falls within Act 2 and the pace understandably slows down as the team tries to figure out what to do next and how to move past their own personal struggles to be an effective team. There is plenty of room for choice but that also removes some of the urgency as you do return to plot quests in your own time and linger with companion and side quests for almost as long as you please. Act 3 is practically perfect. It’s one of the most well-paced third acts I’ve played in a very long time with logical, much needed moments to catch both Rook’s and your breath while never losing the sense of urgency. It also packs one hell of an earned, emotional wallop but that’s all I’ll say about that.

One of the biggest points of emphasis throughout the game’s marketing was on the companions. BioWare even renamed the game from Dreadwolf to The Veilguard earlier this summer to drive that point home. In hindsight, it was a good choice. The game truly is about your companions more so than any other BioWare game has been thus far. You cannot succeed without them on your side because everyone brings something important to the team. The Veilguard feels as if it has more companion content than ever before from the mission banter to the Lighthouse conversations to the sheer number of companion focused quests. In a way, this turns the game into more of a character piece than any of the ones before set in front of the backdrop of an earth shatteringly bad situation. This is also the first Dragon Age game where I truly liked all of the companions. Sure, I have my favorites (looking at you Bellara, Davrin, and Lucanis) but there’s no companion who makes me pull a Lucille Bluth and say as a dramatic aside, “I don’t care for this person.” That’s never happened for me with a Dragon Age game before. There’s always been one companion (if not more) who make me go, “Ugh, this guy,” and they get left behind and only brought out for character-specific missions. The writers put so much love and care into each of the companions and while their specific quests and personal storylines are very focused, they all have depth to them and feel so real. It felt natural to run around the Lighthouse and see them all interacting. I truly hope we get to see more of them.

(Also Bellara Lutare is my favorite perfect, precious, bubbly sad girl genius and I would fight an entire Blight by myself for her.)

I played almost entirely on the standard difficulty level (Adventurer) and played as an elf rogue from the Antivan Crows. Combat is vastly different from previous installments in the Dragon Age and will likely take a little bit of an adjustment but once you’ve got the hang of it, it’s a ton of fun. As a warrior main, I fully expected to play another sword and shield girl but after playing as a rogue on a whim during a Community Council event, I became a rogue main for Veilguard. The skill trees looks overwhelmingly large at first glance but the game allows to you refund skill points and respec Rook whenever you wish if you find that the specialization you’re building towards isn’t vibing with your play style or you simply change your mind. Rogues have an extremely smooth weapon quick swap between dual wielded swords and a bow and I found myself swapping between them constantly. Archery is delightful now and I enjoyed getting snipe enemies from afar. Dodging is just plain fun and successfully deflecting a blow feels oddly satisfying. (When I… uhh… remembered that parrying was an option. My Rook was more prone to jumping and flipping out of danger. Just like me in real life while playing. Don’t ask.) The variety in difficulty levels is also something I think a lot of players will appreciate. While I enjoy the challenge and satisfaction of a good fight, I appreciated being able to drop down to storyteller when I just wasn’t having fun fighting a really tough dragon anymore so I could complete the encounter and move on.

(Speaking of Rook: a huge shout out to Erika Ishii for their incredible performance as one of the Rook voices! It’s going to be hard convincing myself to try out any of the others.)

In terms of both combat and companions, yes, the adjustment down to only two companions is rough. It’s a very similar set up to what Mass Effect has but new to Dragon Age. From a mechanical, game play perspective, it’s fine. The system is actually an improvement upon previous Dragon Age games because you no longer feel locked into certain party arrangements (aka: having a mage, warrior, and rogue at all times) as everyone’s got some form of healing ability (some more effective than others) and there aren’t any troublesome locks to pick. As someone who never used the tactical view in Inquisition, I vastly preferred being able to give orders to companions this new way during combat. While I made an effort to change up party configuration, I did still find myself defaulting back to a small rotation of favorites (I’m only human). Two companions instead of three also makes it a lot harder to allow for duplication of skills and so I had to make distinct efforts to take some pairings (eg: Taash and Davrin) out together which is a shame because they had some great dialogue and banter together that I probably missed. I also missed those rare occasions where you’d find yourself in banter that involved three companions when you were running around Thedas. It felt like a fancy little treat. At least the Lighthouse conversations (see below) help serve as a balm for it.

One of the more discussed aspects of the game pre-release was the handful of choice toggles to customize your previous Dragon Age: Inquisition choices. While I support moving away from the Keep which was unwieldy at best, the lack of references back to previous games and choices was a bit disappointing. The move to northern Thedas was a smart one as it lets players see new parts of the continent and free them from the weight of too many potential world states but at times, it can feel a little too detached from prior games. A few more toggles for things such as what happened to the Wardens after Adamant or who is Divine Victoria and then subsequent references within the game would have been appreciated and helped add in a little more of the connective tissue we’re used to from previous Dragon Age games. On a related note, it did also feel like many of the legacy characters who were brought in were rather underutilized.  While again, events of past games mean there’s a tightrope to walk, it would have been nice to see more of them throughout the story.

Speaking of legacy characters… let’s talk about the Dread Wolf in the room.

Solas is, needless to say, a somewhat polarizing figure in the Dragon Age fandom. Some people can’t wait to kiss him. Others want to punch for what he did in Inquisition. I myself fall into the latter camp. He’s a great character that I love to hate. Prior to playing, I harbored some worries that the game might force players into sympathizing with Solas more than everyone wants to. Those worries were quickly soothed. The Veilguard manages to give both the Solas lovers and haters something to appreciate; fitting for the god of trickery. Dragon Age has always been about making choices and The Veilguard isn’t about to change that now although I do wish that a Solas romanced Inquisitor wasn’t the default world state because such a relatively small fraction of players even had him as an option. That’s easily changeable in character creator though.

A few helpful things to know while playing:

• Visit the Lighthouse often. Experienced BioWare players already know that talking to your companions is an important part of the game both emotionally and sometimes mechanically in order to progress their plotlines. This is exponentially true here. The Veilguard has perhaps the most expansive array of companion chatter I’ve encountered in a BioWare game thus far. Use the map to check in where companions might be because while all of them have their own rooms, they’re often found somewhere else in the Lighthouse, often chatting with another companion. I popped into the Lighthouse extremely frequently and rarely found all of them in their own rooms without anything new to say or without some sort of conversation or quest to trigger.
• The Crossroads is a gorgeous set piece with plenty to explore and offers quests. You should absolutely explore it. You will also encounter enemies there frequently when going to the various mirrors. If you’re not in the mood to fight them yet again… just run past them. And then keep running. It’s okay.
• On a similar note, sometimes you will encounter giant blight boils that will trigger a very high-level enemy that will kill you quickly. You can leave them and come back later when you’re better prepared. You don’t have to suffer through that fight. Yet. I support you saying, “Not today!”
• Some of the companion romances are slow burn. Like…….. extremely slow burn. Glacial. The game will loudly tell you when you’re entering a romance with someone and then again once you’re locked in but if you’re… shall we say… anxious about getting certain romance content? Just keep selecting the heart options. If you got the lock in, you’re doing it right. Some of us just suffered romantically more than others. 😉
• There’s no hidden reason to hold on to your valuables. They’re just there to get you gold and faction points. Sell as you please or hold on to specific ones because they bring you joy.
• If you’re running around and can’t find something for a quest… in the immortal, frustrated words of Hermes in Hadestown, “Look up!”

And finally… if you’ll allow me a few moments of sentimentality.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is a game that will always be very close to my heart. When I received the invitation to join the Community Council a few years ago, it felt a little surreal. It still does sometimes because I’ve spent the last few years getting to provide feedback that had a direct impact on a franchise I love so much. Being a part of the Community Council also gave me the chance to form friendships with people who otherwise would’ve remained relative strangers on the internet. I learned so much from everyone on the Council and they all opened my eyes to aspects of the Dragon Age world that otherwise weren’t as much of an interest to me. That’s not even going into what a privilege it’s been into interact with the devs over the years and have them truly want to hear what I thought about the game they were working so hard to make.

As a part of the Council, I got to play and see The Veilguard in different stages of development and to finally have the finished game in my hands feels so special. A part of me has always been worried that when this moment finally came, either the game wouldn’t meet my expectations, or I would be too close to really dive in and love it like a normal fan. I am relieved that wasn’t the case. I am so happy that I got to play this game and let it take me on the emotional roller coaster of highs and lows as I shrieked high pitched swears during combat one minute and sat there crying through a certain companion’s storyline the next. Dragon Age: The Veilguard has been a truly special game and we’re only just getting started with its release on Thursday, October 31^st.

All right, that’s enough from me. Go get your lyrium dagger, Rook, and let’s go save the world together. I’ll see you in Thedas.